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About Me

I'm just your basic, all-American girl from Denver, Colorado, except for now, I live half way around the world in Japan.: ) I met my husband in university in Denver. College sweethearts. We have been happily married since 1997. And have been together for way longer, about 16 years total. He's originally from Osaka, Japan. We lived for a couple of years in Honolulu Hawaii, where our beautiful first born son, Branden was born. We were sent there by the company my husband works for. He works for an airline by the way. After living in Honolulu, my husband's employer, wanted us to move to Japan. We live in Chiba, Japan. Where we just built our dream home, an import "all American" house! Which means a big GE oven, big GE dishwasher and yes, central heating and central air conditioning, yay! We also have a beautiful second son, named Noah. Since my husband works for an airline like I said, we travel a lot and I really do appreciate the flight benefits. Other then that, I just love spending time with my family and friends and enjoy back yard BBQ's.

Sunday, September 25, 2016

Branden’s 9th grade Sports Day! His final Undokai at the JHS...

Saturday, September 10th was Branden's final Sports Day at the local one and only Junior High School in our tiny town of under 5,000 people. It was a sunny day. The weather was hot, granted not "steam room" middle of summer, type of heat. But it was hot, but we luckily had nice and cool breezes throughout the day. We had a pretty good spot to sit and enjoy watching Branden's final undokai/sports day at this school! Branden running in his first race! He came in 3rd place!

And another event.

Branden laughing with his friends...

Smiling!

This race was for the 8th graders. And they had to blow up a balloon with a bicycle pump and then sit on the balloon, pop it and then run to another event. It was like an obstacle course of sorts! We were all laughing!

Branden and Genki! Best friends since their yochien/kindergarten days. They will not be at the same school next year! So it's good they have this final year! : )

The Tug of War! Go red team! : )

They pulled and pulled and pulled!!!

And then the PTA members and the Father's Club Dad's challenged all 9th graders to a tug of war battle!

Branden really enjoyed his final sports day at the local JHS.

Pull kids pull! : )

Smiling!!!

What a genuinely happy kid! : )

This was a "father and 9th grader" event. It was a 3 legged race while rolling a big giant ball across the field. There went team red! Branden and his dad (Noboru) and Bran's classmate and his dad. This was hilarious to watch.

Love this picture so much! Love these humans so much! : )

Time for lunch! Homemade karaage. Potato salad, macaroni salad. A regular salad. Rice balls. Grapes (seedless enormous Japanese grapes, so delicious!) Lemonade. You can see those frozen pouch drinks of Calpis, I always buy pouch drinks also for undokai, my kids like those. We also had chocolate cake (store bought, but so good) Sports day picnic meals... are usually really special and for the most part, everyone always goes all out, regarding their obento. So, I try my best too. Oh and those 2 unopened boxes of tissues were gifts for Noboru for running in races. : )

Eat kiddo! : )

Noah drinking some lemonade. And why yes...we recognize that shirt! That's the OshKosh shirt I got on sale at Costco. : )

These grapes were seriously so ginormous, they were karaage size. These were freakishly big grapes. Hahaha. : ) But they were so delicious. : )

Between the regular salad, macaroni salad and potato salad, hmm, I ate more salad than karaage. : ) But I like to eat a little bit of everything. The kids were so stuffed after lunch. Noboru was too. Time to enjoy the last bit of the undokai.

There was a chicken fight. There were pyramids. There was even a girls dance team. They also danced! Square dancing! I enjoyed this very much. The kids enjoyed this too. There was a final relay race and then that was it! We all packed up. And we parents left. The JHS kids all ride bikes to school on undokai day, because there are so many school tents and stuff to dismantle. So they were leaving about 45 minutes after undokai was over. Branden rode home with Genki and a good bunch of his friends who live near our house. : )

Noah and I meanwhile had a kakigori/shave ice before leaving the JHS. I picked green apple! Noah picked cola!

Branden came home. He quickly took a hot soapy shower as soon as he got home and parked his bike in the shed. After his shower we 4 drove to Jolly Pasta for dinner. Since it was Branden's undokai it was Bran's choice for dinner. We always go out to celebrate as a family after Sports Day. Branden loves Jolly Pasta. Our nearest one is an hour away! That's far, but then we do live way out in the inaka! But...with nobody having school or work the next day, we said...okay. When we arrived we were starving.

We all had pasta, we had pizza, we had an all you can drink, "drink bar" just sodas, juice, iced tea and iced and hot coffee, etc. But it was a truly awesome way to end our day this way.

And because the red team won! Which because our school is so truly teeny tiny... all class A's were team red and all class B's were team white (7th, 8th and 9th). The 9th grade A class, which were team red decided on Friday...if they win, then they would go out to eat together on Sunday. So, since they won, the next day, on Sunday, all 9th grade red team/class A kids...all met in the "small city" nearest our town at a shabu shabu restaurant. It rained hard the day after Bran's undokai. So we all drove our kids to the shabu shabu restaurant. : ) All us town folks met up in the parking lot, in the city nearest us... dropping off our kids. And they did have a reservation. Us parents made sure of that. : ) And then we all picked them up, when it was time to pick them up. So all in all, it was a fantastic way to end Branden's final Sports Day at the JHS. : )

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About the Blog

This blog was started for everybody I care about and love back home, it sorta helps my family and friends feel more connected to me and my life. It's also a place to make new friendships, support one another, laugh our butts off at times, and just be kind to one another and hang out! So please join me, while I try living my life in Japan, all the good, the bad and yes even the embarrassing blunders that I will probably be making along the way! : )